


One Good Deed

by Pythia (Mythichistorian)



Category: Tales of the Gold Monkey
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-29 21:40:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16751968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mythichistorian/pseuds/Pythia
Summary: The natives say it's not safe to land, let alone linger, on the islands in the Sulera atoll.  Corky's about to find out why ...





	1. Part One

_Somewhere in the Pacific: 1938_

There were three things in the world that Corky hated more than anything.

The first was knowing exactly what was wrong with something and not being able to fix it because he didn’t have the bits he needed. The second was having to wait for an indeterminable time for someone else to deliver before he could do anything himself, and the third was spending unoccupied time in a place where there was absolutely no prospect whatsoever of a decent drink.

All of which made waiting for Jake Cutter to return to a totally deserted island with the one part they needed to repair the Goose a distinctly uncomfortable experience.

It had started off as such a good day, too. They’d left Merike early that morning with a cargo of bits and pieces, three passengers bound for the mission on Peratea, and the money for both burning a hole in Cutter’s pocket. They’d delivered the passengers, picked up four pigs in exchange, and had headed for the next stop with dispatch, looking forward to their return to Boragora after a long week’s absence. They’d refuelled on the Bautier plantation and turned over the Sulera atoll, expecting to be home in time for tea. Over the last few islands in the scattered chain they’d argued with a flock of birds: the starboard engine had quit completely and, since the port prop had been labouring for quite a while, Cutter had set the plane down on the nearest beach so they could get a better look at the damage.  
Corky had sworn, loudly, on finding the damaged engine full of blood and feathers. He’d added a few more choice words on discovering that the propeller shaft had been pushed completely out of kilter, damaging part of the rotary mechanism that supported it. He had a replacement – except it was sat under a tarpaulin on Boragora’s dock, along with the rest of the spares he kept there. While he was identifying that problem, Cutter had been examining the port engine. He announced he didn’t like the look of it, a statement Corky had to agree with, since several internal pins had sheared and the whole substructure was uncomfortably loose. The pilot expressed and opinion that it would not be worth risking the last two hours home with only one suspect engine to carry them; his mechanic had flatly refused to even let him try.

It was while making that decision that they had spotted the fishermen heading in their direction. Two canoes out of Aratopa, Borogora’s nearest inhabited neighbour, had been line fishing in the lagoon and had seen the plane touch down. One of them had come to offer assistance, insisting that the islands were unsafe and that no-one in their right mind spent any time on them. Cutter had been dismissive about this; the island they had picked was scarcely half a mile across and was little more than a shallow mound of coral sand that supported a small scattering of trees. It certainly didn’t look dangerous and it wasn’t big enough to hide anything that might be. He’d accepted the fishermen’s offer of a lift, ordering Corky to stay with the plane until her returned with the necessary bits they needed to fix it.  
Actually, they’d tossed for it. Corky had lost, as he so often did, and had only been cheered by the fact that Jack had resolutely refused to join his master in the flimsy canoe for a journey that was going to take several hours.

The natives had only agreed to leave anyone on the island after a great deal of protest; they’d left offering contradicting advice about not venturing too far off the beach and staying away from the water’s edge after dark. Their parting shot was a suggestion that he let the pigs out so that the demon spirit that stalked the place would have something else to hunt. This idea had bothered Corky more than he cared to admit, but he’d waved Cutter away with a forced cheerfulness and returned to the confines of the plane with trepidation, a nonchalant Jack at his heels.

That had been a couple of hours ago. He’d sat and watched the waves roll in on the beach, listened to the seabirds fight over some indeterminate prize, and patently failed to see any demons materialise out of the undergrowth. Or the sea. Or even the clean white sand.

Bored, he’d fiddled with the radio, catching snatches of dance music broadcast from the Philippines before he lost it in a scatter of static. It was only after that, that it occurred to him to let anyone else know what was going on; the familiar sound of Gushie’s voice, washed into blurred words by the shortwave transmission, did a lot to dispel the sense of unease that had begun to settle over him. He’d explained the situation, predicted Cutter’s arrival, and expressed a desire to beat him home. Gushie had sympathised and promised to save him a cold beer – a well intention remark, although it only served to remind its recipient just how far away he was from the taste of a decent drink. He’d signed off with a sigh, imagining the Monkey Bar slowly filling with its early evening customers. Sarah would miss him at the piano that night, although he suspected that she would not feel like singing until she knew that Cutter had arrived safe home. There would a cold beer waiting on the bar for him, too …

He was, Corky realised, bored, uncomfortable, and wary of a native superstition that might have some hidden truth in it somewhere.

He was also badly in need of a drink.

Anxious for something the keep his mind off that particular desire, he went in search of some fresh greenery to feed his four legged passengers. The sun was low in the sky, dropping from late afternoon towards dusk, and there was a cool breeze drifting in over the ocean. He kicked at shells in the sand as he walked, finding a piece of sea smoothed driftwood for Jack to chase. The natives hadn’t been very clear about the nature of the force that was rumoured to stalk the many islands in the atoll. Glancing across the channel that separated his current beach from the one that bordered the next island in the chain, Corky considered that it either had to be a very good swimmer or else possessed of wings. The thought had him casting anxious glances at the sky as he walked.

He didn’t have any particular reason for his sense of unease, other than the unspecific mutterings of natives who claimed that ‘something’ had been seen on islands viewed from the safe distance of the sea. The sand on the beach was free of tracks of any hind, and the only thing that moved in the island’s interior were the tops of palm trees and the flutter of birds wings. Even Jack seemed unconcerned, condescending to return the tossed stick and wait for it to be thrown a second time. Corky wasn’t sure if the dog was acting out of a sense of enjoyment or one of duty. Normally the one eyed mutt was above such pointless exercises, considering anyone who so much as suggested play with total disdain. But he seemed happy enough, racing off into the fring of the tree line to retrieve the tumbling missile, kicking up a scattering of sand as he went.

He didn’t come back. 

This didn’t register immediately, the stocky mechanic occupied with encumbering himself with fallen cabbage palm leaves. He filled his arms and turned to stagger back towards the waiting plane. The back pulled him to a startled halt; Jack, distant but unmistakable. He dropped his burden without a moment’s thought and sprinted into the undergrowth, unlimbering his gun and calling out as he ran.

“Hold on, Jack! I’m coming! I’ll be right …”

He swallowed his last few words in surprise, skidding to a desperate halt as the reached the edge of an unexpected hollow. Soil and sand crumbled under his feet as he fought to overcome his momentum, and he teetered briefly on the brink – then everything gave way and he slid, ungracefully, down a steep slope before squelching to an undignified halt at the bottom of a waterlogged pit.

Jack trotted over and nudged him, whuffing a little with satisfaction as the gesture elicited a wary groan. Corky levered himself up onto his hands with tentative care and stared up the cause of his downfall. He’d fallen some fifteen feet or so, not an impossible descent but a painful one in the unexpected circumstances. The hollow appeared to be the result of subsidence, its rough cut walls sporting shallow tree roots at their upper edges.

“Oh, great,” he muttered, easing his shoulders carefully and turning onto his behind to consider his options. He sat, and having sat, stared in astonishment. He and the dog were not alone.

The depression was some twenty feet wide at the most, its lowest point sodden with the water that was spilling over the upper edge in a miniscule waterfall. Perched on the far side of the resultant pool, its tail curled into the surface of the water, was a creature unlike any the mechanic had ever seen.

It might have been a lizard. A very large lizard, since it looked to be a match to his own height if measured from nose to tail; but no lizard he knew of sported a pair of leathery wings that sprang from behind its shoulder blades. No lizard was ever blessed with a scaled skin that rippled with iridescent blues and silvers, or possessed eyes of such brilliant green beneath the sculpted ridges on its crested head. It was beautiful, and totally impossible – and it was watching him with disturbing intentness.

Corky smiled nervously, reaching down his hand to retrieve his fallen cap and jam it firmly back on his head. His gun sat, temptingly out of reach, some five feet away. The dragon – it had to be a dragon, his mind insisted, despite the impossibility of such a thing – stared across at him unblinkingly. After a while it yawned, displaying an impressive set of white teeth arrayed in scarlet line mouth before its jaws closed with a definitive clash. The mechanic swallowed hard. He knew how fast an alligator could move if it wanted to, and he was under no illusions concerning this particular creature, however mythological it appeared to be. It was quite real, and almost certainly very dangerous.

“Get the gun, Jack,” he hissed out of the side of his mouth, smiling nervously as the sound drew the creature’s attention. The dog turned his head to look at his human companion rather strangely; then he got to his feet and pattered away round the edge of the pool. “Jack!” Corrky swallowed the scream with difficulty. One the other side of the pit the dragon swivelled its jewelled head and stared down at the approaching animal with unreadable intent.

Taking a deep breath, the mechanic dived for his fallen weapon, his hands fumbling over the metal shape and urgency speeding his heart so that it pounded inside him like a drum. He rolled over, bringing the muzzle of the weapon to bear, and froze, registering the tableaux in front of him.

The dragon had barely moved. Its head was bent forward on its sinuous neck, bringing it nose to nose with the small dog, its mouth slightly open – and Jack was wagging his stump of a tail, his head tilted to one side, the better to see his new acquaintance. Corky slowly lowered the barrel of the gun and stared at the unexpected sight. Jack finished his self-introduction and sank to his haunches, glancing back at Corky as if to ask ‘what’s all the fuss about?’ The dragon’s head swung up, following the animal’s gaze and Corky found himself, once again, the object of the creature’s scrutiny.

He tucked the gun back into his belt thoughtfully, and pushed the cap back on his head as he studied the unlikely pair. “Jake’s never going to believe this,” he muttered to himself, not entirely sure he believed it either.

Jack barked twice in general agreement, starting the jewelled monster into a backward scramble. Only so far. It stopped with an abrupt jerk and let out a little warbling cry of pain.

Now, Corky didn’t know a lot about dragons. He’d been raised on gruesome fairy tales concerning avenging princes and then spent months in a country where the dragon was considered divine. The result was a rather ambiguous confusion as to whether the beast was likely to eat him or not; but he knew distress when he heard it, and it took only a few seconds to identify the source of the problem.

Far from being free to race across the intervening distance and devour him, the dragon was firmly entangled in a confusion of tough vines, its struggles obviously only serving to entangle it further.. Like the man, and the dog before him, the creature had probably tumbled into the unexpected pit, its wings dragging the binding vegetation down with it. It was well and truly trapped, and could do nothing to free itself.

A wave of pity washed over Cory’s genial face. He hated to see anything suffering, and this beautiful creature did not belong down in this muddy hole, no matter how dangerous it might be. It tugged at the entanglement and warbled again, a low pitched, pitiful sound.

“Easy fella,” the mechanic advised, climbing slowly to his feet and edging cautiously around the pool. “I ain’t gonna hurt you.”

It was a rather ridiculous thing to say, he thought, eyeing the display of teeth and claws that the creature possessed, but it seemed to do the trick all the same. It ceased its struggles and looked at him with disturbingly intelligent eyes.

“Now then,” he thought aloud. “What are we going to do?”

He glanced up at the walls of the pit, trying to assess of he had any means of escape should the situation turn ugly. It didn’t look very promising. He thought that he could climb out, given time and a little effort, but that trying to do so with a hundred pound plus monster on his heels might prove a little more difficult. “You and I have to come to an agreement,” he considered, hunkering down at the creature’s side and fishing in his pocket for his knife. The dragon looked back with unreadable concentration, although the mechanic had the uncomfortable feeling it understood him perfectly.

“I cut you out of this,” he suggested, pulling open the blade, “and you don’t eat me or Jack, okay?”

Silence. The dragon ducked its head to nose at one of the vines that held it. Then, abruptly, the long neck shot out and jaws closed firmly on the man’s wrist. By some miracle Corky managed not to drop the knife. For all the sheer impact of panic that raced through him he held as steady as a rock, acutely aware that to jerk away might cost him his hand.

Two things registered slowly. The first was that the powerful jaws, generously equipped with teeth, had closed on his arm as gently as a child’s touch, and the second was that the breath that now caressed his skin was unexpectedly warm. It was not, he realised in some surprise, the mouth of a lizard at all. He looked down to meet emerald eyes staring up at him. The dragon was oddly gentle, its lips soft and velvet, its tongue a warm wet roughness against his skin. Summoning up a nervous smile he ran his own tongue over the dryness of his lips and sought desperately for his voice.

“I’ll be real careful,” he croaked, trying to put in as much reassurance as he could. Somewhere off to one side Jack barked twice in ready agreement. The green eyes continued to consider him for a while, a long moment in which he felt sweat trickle down the small of his back – and then the insistent grip was released, the head drawing back reluctantly. Corky glanced down and registered the ordered line of indentations on his wrist where teeth had marked, but not pierced, his skin, and found that he could breath after all.

Carefully, he reached out and began to saw at the first of the tough vines that held the creature tight. It was a tricky job, not made any easier by the comprehension that the animal under his hands was perfectly capable of killing him should he make the slightest mistake. Inch by inch he managed it nonetheless, the dragon only once having cause to catch at his arm, and that only to pull at the fabric of his coveralls in protest rather than with menace.

By the time he was finished he was lathered in sweat and caked with mud, his amrs aching and his back screaming in protest. He paused to wipe moisture from his eyes and then leant back, releasing the creature from his weight. The dragon moved cautiously, the stretched, and finally stood up and shook, showering everything around it with mud, sand, and water.

Its trumpet voice announced its pleasure with jubilant notes; it scrambled back a little, and then leapt, straight towards its exhausted rescuer. Corky threw himself flat in sheer terror, tense for the moment of attack – only to register the rustle of unfolding wings and a beat of air as the creature reached for the wind.

And was gone.

There was nothing left behind in the pit but a churning of mud and a single, glittering scale, lying at the water’s edge. Corky reached out and collected it, turning it over and over in his hand. Then he sighed, letting it tumble from his grip while he turned his mind to other things.

It was a slow and painful climb out of the pit, Jack tucked under one arm and protesting at the necessity. He ached all over, from bruises and sheer effort. It was almost completely dark by the time he reached the top, the thin red slice of sky at the horizon throwing the world into stark shadows. He put Jack down on level ground and glanced around cautiously.

Nothing moved, apart from the general shiver of vegetation in the evening breeze. Sighing, he dragged himself back to the Goose where the pigs squealed angrily at being disturbed. He pulled a blanket from the rear compartment and settled into the nearest passenger seat; sleep came faster than he expected it, and it was filled with dreams of silver blue dragons who served him cold beer in the Monkey Bar. Jack curled up in the man’s lap and settled there. If he dreamt of anything, he didn’t report it in the morning.


	2. Chapter 2

Morning was a bleary insistence of daylight that forced its way under his eyelids. Corky groaned and woke reluctantly, cocooned in the warmth of sleep. His mouth, as usual, was full of cobwebs and tar, and he ached in all sorts of places that he’d forgotten he possessed. The pigs were grunting impatiently and he forced himself up to pour them some fresh water. This woke all sorts of other sensations and he climbed stiffly out of the hatch and went to relieve himself further down the beach.

The events of the previous day were a cloudy blur in his memory that mingled with the night’s dreams. Had he imagined the exquisite creature trapped in the subsided hollow? There were no such things as dragons, he told himself sternly, pausing to splash a handful of cold seawater over his sleep stained face. His chin was rough with morning stubble, but he never let that bother him. He pulled his cap out of the pocket he’d jammed it into the night before and resettled it on his head while he glanced out to sea. Cutter would be hours away yet, and he’d had the privilege of a night in a decent bed. Corky sighed and kicked at a handy pebble, frowning a little as a shadow passed between him and the sun. Clouds, he dismissed, depressed at the possibility of rain, and turned to walk back to the plane, wondering – firstly how long he was going to have to wait, and secondly whether there was any hope of breakfast.

The shadow set down in front of him.

Sheer terror lifted his heart into his throat.

The demon of Sulera was not a silver blue dragonette, man height in length and pretty as a garden butterfly. The thing that confronted him now was a nightmare of beauty, gold and bronze and flame, all eyes and teeth and talons wrapped up in an undulation of body and wing that seemed to go on forever.

His mind screamed at him to run, but his body failed miserably to obey it; he stood frozen to the spot while the storm its wings raised buffeted about him. Fear drove the breath from his lungs and slowly buckled his knees under him, yet he could not tear his eyes from the cathedral window of its gaze, could find no strength to seek refuge from the overwhelming terror of its presence.

It reached for him idly, one taloned claw closing around his bulky form to imprison him for its consideration. The mouth opened, a yawning chasm of white teeth and crimson darkness in which its tongue writhed like a scarlet snake.

“Nooooo,” he moaned, no breath to scream, his limbs turned to water and his stomach churning; his heart fought for escape inside his ribs, but they were encased in a cage of steel that was slowly tightening around him. The cathedral windows blinked lazily, one idle snap up and down; the curled claw lifted, plucking him from the sand as easily as if were a feather. Then a flare of blue and silver darted in from nowhere, its voice a nagging trumpet of distress.

The tiny dragon was nothing next to the impossible creature it so resembled; a scrap of glittering fabric outmatched against the fire of diamond and gold. Yet the massive head turned slowly in its direction, considering its anxiety with patient attention. Sound receded, the whisper of the surf drowned behind the pounding of his heartbeat. Time slowed: he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move, held in the grip of eternity, considered by eyes that had nothing in common with the insignificance of mankind.

Eventually – a lifetime – the taloned claw released him. He slid down, unresisting, and sprawled on the coral sand, quivering with terror.

“Little man,” a distant voice echoed inside his mind, “you do well to fear.” There was a laugh deep within the sound, a presence from which his mind sought refuge, yet could no more escape than his body had been able to do. “I have no liking for your pitiful kind in my garden,” the voice continued with a hint of contempt, “but you have shown compassion and courage beyond any that I would think to expect. Perhaps there is hope for your race yet.”

There was a pause in which an imponderable presence shifted with the rustle of scales and the creak of wings that could span the world. “For your courage, you earn your life. For you compassion, my gratitude. Do not presume on it overmuch.” Again the distant laugh, cold and majestic, and then the presence in his mind was gone, lifted with the stir of the shadow that engulfed him, vanished with the force of wings spread wide upon the world.

He didn’t know how long he lay there, curled into a tight ball and shaking from head to toe. To recall the confrontation was to retreat, whimpering, from reality. It was the impact of rain that eventually roused him, soft droplets hammering swiftly into a heavy curtain. Numb to the core, he lifted himself to his feet, staring at the blurred horizon without seeing it. Somehow he staggered across the beach and into the fragile safety of the waiting plane.

The pigs were gone. The inside of te Goose had been rifled by agile talons, blankets tumbling into cockpit, cargo scattered in amongst the seats. There were marks that might have been made with claws on the flooring, and the warm scent of dragon in the air, spicy and exotic. Jack crept slowly from the lower hold, his tail tucked under him, and climbed insistently into the mechanic’s lap as he sank into the pilot’s seat. Overwhelmed and feeling insignificant.

A long time later hunger stirred him into some kind of action. He found a still whole packet of biscuits and a cheese and shared them with the dog. His body cried out for a drink, for something to dim the emblazoned memory of the morning, something to offer him the safety of refuge and security of oblivion. There was no chance of any such thing, so he set to tidying the interior of the plane, wondering how he was going to explain events to his absent friend.

“See, Jake, there was this dragon and …” No. Stupid, crazy idea. No-one would believe him. No-one would take the word of a half reformed drunk when he spoke of the splendour of heaven.

The thought made him pause, and he glanced out of the cockpit window at the downpour of rain. The Chinese taught of how the dragons had rule of the winds and the rain, and how they were the embodiment of forces beyond human understanding. He shivered, the terror of the moment still echoing in his soul. For all that, it had been glorious, a privilege. To have looked upon the face of such, and to have lived … perhaps it would be better to say nothing at all. The pigs could have just escaped and be running on the island somewhere. Maybe he’d offer to pay for them. That would be best.

He stood in the side hatch and watched as the sun returned from behind the clouds, gilt edged and shining. He smiled, tracing the passage of a serpentine form in the twist and rolls of the thunderhead as it drifted away. A sudden impact of hail, short and unexpected, ducked him back into the cabin. When he looked again the last of the clouds had gone, leaving the sunlight glinting on the white coral sand – and reflecting in the soft glow from s a scattering of stones that were most certainly not made of ice …

By the time Jake Cutter appeared, lugging the box of parts up the beach, Corky had safely collected a bag of fifteen perfect pearls and hidden them carefully inside his overalls. Like the disappearance of the pigs, they too would be difficult to explain. He had no intention of spending them, anyway. Dragon pearls were lucky pieces, tokens of future happiness. Their presence gave him a warm feeling somewhere deep inside. Fifteen shimmers of beauty, each the size of a dragon’s tooth as it pressed into his skin and tested his resolve.

The rain had washed away all memories of his morning visitation from the sand. He ducked under the wing of the Goose and grinned at the pilot as he waved farewell to the helpful fishermen. “Ain’t they going to stay for coffee, Jake?”

Cutter shook his head with amusement. “Nope. Still muttering about this place being haunted or something. Louie tells me they used to call these islands ‘The Dragon’s Necklace’ before the missionaries persuaded them there’s no such thing. Quiet night?”

“Ah – yeah.” Corky hesitated, his mind recalling the undulation of gold and fire along the beach.

“Great. Here – you get these bits patched together and I’ll get us back to Boragora before Louie changes his mind. He said the first beer would be on the house.”

The mechanic’s eyes lit up. “He did?”

“Uhu-huh. Guess your luck is looking up, right?”

Corky didn’t answer for a moment. His hand drifted to brush the contents of his pocket and his eyes darted towards the line of vegetation at the edge of the beach. Something lfashed there, blue and silver, and was gone. “Gee, Jake,” he finally murmured. “What took you so long? Jack and I have been half bored to death, haven’t we, Jack?”

One bark - a pause – and then a second, sharp and conformational. Jake Cutter shook his head in amused confusion.

“I came as fast as I could,” he said. “You can’t expect and adventure every trip, you know.” He paused and looked at his friend suspiciously. “Or is there something you’re not telling me?”

Corky’s genial face creased into a brief frown; then he shook his head and found a flippant grin instead. “Ya think? Maybe … nah. Nothing worth remembering, I guess.”

His shrug was dismissive – but for the rest of his life, that would be the one day he would _never_ forget.


End file.
